Hussein Dakroub – The Daily Star
Caretaker Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil plans to meet with the six Hezbollah-backed Sunni lawmakers this week in an attempt to resolve the issue of their representation that has blocked the formation of a new Cabinet since last month, one of the six MPs said Sunday. MP Abdel-Rahim Mrad, one of the six Sunni MPs from outside the Future Movement, said that after the planned talks with Bassil, expected in the next 48 hours, the six MPs would request a meeting with Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri in hopes of breaking the Cabinet impasse over their representation, which has been rejected outright by Hariri.
“Minister Bassil, being the mediator in the issue of the six independent Sunni MPs’ representation, has spoken to me by telephone, asking for a meeting with us. Minister Bassil will brief us on the outcome of his talks with various leaders aimed at resolving the problem of our representation in the new government,” Mrad told The Daily Star.
He said no final date has yet been set for the meeting with Bassil, the leader of the Free Patriotic Movement. But a political source close to the Cabinet formation process said the meeting would take place either Monday or Tuesday.
Mrad stressed that the six MPs’ demand to be represented in the next government by one of them was “irreversible.”
“It is our right according to the [National] Pact [on power sharing] to be represented in the government in the same way the Shiites were represented by two parties [Hezbollah and the Amal Movement], the Christians were represented by two parties [the FPM and the Lebanese Forces], and the Druze sect was represented by [former MP Walid Joumblatt’s bloc] and a neutral Druze candidate,” Mrad said, adding: “Why doesn’t this apply to the Sunnis?”
But Hariri has stood firm on his refusal to cede one seat from the Future Movement’s share to the six MPs because they had not formed a unified political bloc. President Michel Aoun has backed Hariri’s position. “The solution to the Cabinet formation issue is not with me, but with the others,” Hariri said at a dinner hosted by a group of businessmen at the Four Seasons Hotel Friday night. He was responding to Hezbollah officials, as well as the six Sunni MPs. Hezbollah and the Amal Movement have backed the six MPs’ demand for representation in the government.
Hariri also said that any Cabinet to be formed would include in its statement “all reforms and projects” approved at the CEDRE conference.
Held in Paris in April, the CEDRE conference raised over $11 billion in grants and soft loans pledged by countries and international organizations to finance investment and infrastructure projects. Lebanon pledged at the conference to carry out structural reforms to revitalize the sluggish economy. However, the implementation of the reforms remains contingent on the formation of a new government.Speaking to Al-Jadeed TV Sunday, former Future Movement MP Mustafa Alloush said: “Prime Minister Hariri will not accept to represent the six Sunni MPs, either from his own share or from the share of others.”
At Aoun’s request following his meeting earlier this month with the six Sunni MPs, Bassil has held talks with Speaker Nabih Berri, Hariri, Joumblatt, Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah, Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdel-Latif Derian and Maronite Patriarch Beshara Rai as part of his shuttle diplomacy aimed at exploring a solution to the six MPs’ representation problem that has posed as the last hurdle to the Cabinet formation.
Bassil is seeking to promote a solution, which was supported by Berri, calling for a compromise Sunni candidate to be named as a minister in the new Cabinet. The candidate would be part of Aoun’s share and acceptable to both the six MPs and Hariri.
Asked if the six MPs would accept a compromise Sunni candidate to represent them in the next government, Mrad said: “We don’t want to give an answer now before we meet with Minister Bassil to see what his proposals are to resolve the problem.”
A political source familiar with the formation process said Bassil would try in his talks with the six Sunni parliamentarians to make a “breakthrough” in the Cabinet deadlock and also arrange a meeting between them and Hariri.
“We are at a dead-end regarding the Cabinet formation. No-one is talking to anyone and all the parties concerned with the issue Hariri, Hezbollah and the six Sunni MPs have toughened their positions, refusing to budge an inch,” the source told The Daily Star.
“Being the communication link among the different parties, Bassil will try to find a solution. But no one can predict whether Bassil’s moves will yield positive results,” the source said.
Speaking to a local TV station Sunday night, Bassil said: “The efforts I am making at President Aoun’s request to resolve the Cabinet formation problem are still at the beginning.”
Earlier in the day, Bassil denied that the delay in the government formation was due to regional developments.
“We want to form a government that protects the state and our national unity. It is our duty to do this work emanating from our independence because we do not link our government to any external situation or any external bet,” Bassil told a FPM procession held at Nahr al-Kalb on the occasion of Independence Day.
“Our bet is only on our independence. God willing, we as Lebanese will agree on Lebanon and form a national unity government.”
Although both Hariri and Nasrallah have denied any Saudi or Iranian role respectively in the delay in the Cabinet formation, Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea accused Iran of preventing the Cabinet formation in Lebanon and obstructing the Iraqi government after it was formed in order to face the “massive American pressure” following the imposition of U.S. sanctions on Tehran on Nov. 4.
“It is difficult to predict what the situation will be concerning the Cabinet formation issue because it is no longer related to internal factors or calculations, but linked to Iran’s estimation of the situation,” Geagea said, addressing via Skype an LF conference in North America Saturday. The speech was released Sunday.
“If [Iran] sees that it benefits from obstructing [the government formation], then this might go on for several months. But if it sees that [the obstruction] will negatively impact it and it won’t be able to invest it politically, it will then allow the government to be formed,” he added.
Geagea also said that the issue of representing the six Sunni MPs in the government was a “fabricated” matter. “The question is why didn’t they attend the [parliamentary] consultations as one bloc? The clear answer is that there is no bloc for the March 8 Sunnis,” he added.
